My Favorite Characters: The Imaginative Ion

With the 12 hour comic challenge and the 48 hour bitch-virus-from-hell successfully defeated, I wish you a mucus-free Happy St. Patrick's day!
In honor of the greenest day, I bring you Earth's greenest Green Lantern (what with Jade being dead and all (oh, Jade, why? why?)) Kyle Rayner.
I really dig Green Lantern comics. And my favorite local (Earth) boy in that venerable veridian cadre is the newbie.
O.K., that doesn't mean I don't like the rage-o-holic Guy Gardener, the venerable Alan Scott, the non-t.v.-pundit John Stewart, and (despite the excellent recent efforts of the excellent Geoff Johns) last place after a dead green girl, a 31st Century guy (also dead), and an unofficial 24th-and-1/2 Century cartoon mallard: Hal Jordan.
It just means I like Kyle, all right?
And what's not to like? Created in 1994 by Ron Marz and company, I just gotta resonate with the slacker artist type. I like Kyle for saying what his character has said for 16 years: that a randomly selected pretty good human with imagination and a loving heart is equally as worthy as 'the most fearless man' or 'the most honest man'. Not that I advocate cowardice and dishonesty. It's just that 'Fearless' and 'Honest' as the only criterion in giving out nigh-infinite power results in Guy Gardener (who, though I love him, is a total lunatic). Plus, they hired Sinestro with those qualities. And he's a control freak space dictator.
Poor Kyle Rayner is as quick to fall in love as the universe seems willing to kill his lovers. And I can't find it in my heart to blame Kyle as the dead girlfriends pile up like cordwood. I can't help but like a guy who loves, loses, loves again, loses again, loves and loses, loves upon her surprisingly unlikely resurrection and still loses, and now, loves again.
Cross your fingers, Dr. Soranik Natu of Korugar, brave red daughter of Sinestro: Kyle Rayner loves you.
So keep loving even when the universe is against you, use your imagination, and be human. Like that best of a bad lot of 90's kids: Kyle Rayner.

An Emotional Spectrum of Comic-Creating Madness

Oh, the horror! The Horror!
Once again I unleash upon an unsuspecting world the full force of my extremely mediocre comic-making abilities!
Five years now I've participated with varying degrees of success in Happy Harbor Comics events. Painstakingly rendering entire 24 page comics in 24 hours, 12 page comics in 12 hours, whatever the market will bear. And all for worthy causes, most recently, the Big Brothers/Big Sisters organization.
All several of my fans have marveled at the exploits of 'superhero' Monkey McDevill, sexy angel Lynnyth Van Vavavoom, space adventurers Stalwart & Tru, and my own autobiographical dinner with Boba Fett.
This year, if all goes well, I want to goad myself into completing the superhero comedy novel I've percolated in my head for too damn long (since last summer). So, if I can wrangle a tie-in, I will.
Random theme, event, and character are chosen in the morning, which may make a tie-in impossible.
But that's the challenge, right?
All hail fair Happy Harbor Comics, and Jay Bardyla who sails her. Like a shepherd. In a mixed metaphor of some kind.
Oh, Coast City! Why, why?!
(And, yes, the grey at my temples DOES indicate my recent and tragic possession by Parrallax the yellow demon of fear.)

FAME!!!

You know, it sounds awesome in 'The Muppet Movie' when Orson Welles offers 'the standard rich and famous contract'. Except that every so often, too often, the last line in that contract is 'suicide and/or drug overdose'.
Corey Haim, Andrew Koenig, Brad Renfro, Johnathan Brandis, River Phoenix, and many others: I'm counting my lucky stars today that I was never a Teen Heartthrob. Even though I still want to be rich I think I'd prefer to live without fame.
And, so many famous writers were drunks and suicides that it's practically a cliche. If I want to be a writer, does that mean eating a gun like Hemingway?
Forget it! If the cost of fame is death I'd rather live a thousand years in obscurity.
Some douchebag once said 'It's better to burn out than fade away'. To hell with that! Fade and fade more and keep fading and when you're bored of fading go work at TGI Friday's and then keep on fading on. Because there is SO MUCH MORE to being a human than being a holy golden spotlight god.
Learn to snuggle up to Obscurity and give it a little smooch: it's where most of us have always and will always live. And it's a billion times better than dead.
And here's another cliche while I'm spouting them: don't do drugs. For god's sake, keep away from that shit. Even and especially booze and cigs. You know they kill more than all the rest put together. None of them solve your problems. Except one very permanent solution.
I know there's no point to lecturing you guys. Haim's own friends and family were helpless: how much more helpless is some guy who just watched 'Lost Boys' once upon a time?
I know it's meaningless to say it, but suicide is just so selfish and sad.
Take care of yourselves.

Gushy McFanboy: The Dirty 3530's

A shout out to my buddy Carlos for the loan of some SF classics (next up: John Carter of Mars!). Specifically, Northwest of Earth, the Complete Northwest Smith by Catherine Lucille Moore. I was most pleased and taken aback: this is very sexy, sensual stuff! Who knew they had sex in the 1930's? Weird.
These weird tales neatly employ aspects of all the speculative fiction genres: extensively realized alien worlds of SF, the ancient magics, slaves, and swords you expect from fantasy, and the ravenous, slavering extra-dimensional gods and demons you shiver at in horror stories.
Northwest Smith is the Man With No Name in space. His job is morally questionable, his surroundings alien, his past... no doubt unsettling. His pass-times include drinking to excess, plying the space-ways on dubious errands, and pushing back the forces of unspeakable evil gnawing, ever gnawing at the borders of reality. There are plenty of thrills here of all kinds. Plenty of horrors, too, the quiet kind that eat at you later when they're peckish.
"Shambleau" remains a darn good cautionary tale. If you take a soul-sucking sex-kitten-slash-Medusa back to your place you'd better hope you have a friend or mild acquaintance to flame-gun her off you. Eventually.
The writing is very florid, but don't let it put you off (assuming like me you are deeply, irrationally prejudiced against The Past). Consider 'Nymph of Darkness'. That one was my favorite. Was it the nude, invisible, female object of a creepy cult's worship? Her demonic mode of transport? Or that, like Indiana Jones to come, Northwest's presence in the story isn't even that essential?
Check this writer out! Or, if you're of a more fantasy bent, try her 'Lady Conan': Jirel of Joiry. Northwest Smith met Jirel while time-travelling once: she's a feisty 15th century French Xena.
Huzzah for cross-overs!

Captain Complainy: The Future Begins With a Foregone Conclusion

All right, I've heard enough gushing about this and that and songs of praise for moldy old Hugos and crusty primitive CGI! It's time once again for hardcore, no-compromise hating from your old pal, Captain Complainy!
I tolerated Battleglum Galacticglum. I even liked it now and then. The thing is, I have very damn little choice when it comes to new TV SF. If I want TV SF, (AND BELIEVE ME, I REALLY, REALLY DO!) then I have to really get in there and scrape the bottom of the barrel to FIND me some TV SF. And, perhaps predictably, that's not what Caprica IS. SF, I mean. It IS on TV. I'll give it that.
Caprica is a prequel series to BSG in much the same way Dallas is a prequel to Space Precinct. That is to say, Dallas is set in the past.
Well, there IS a kid called Adama. Oh, boy, do I feel sorry for that guy. He could be the best actor in the world (he's not) and he's STILL gonna get a lot of whiny fanboys complaining about him. Me? Not so much. My problems with this show go far beyond one kid doing his best.
Minor problem 1: Prequels have worn out their welcome with me. When the show begins we already know: Cylons were created, Cylons were enslaved, Cylons revolted. So... what? Now you're going to SHOW me that? Week by week? For YEARS? Or will, somehow, hilarity ensue? OF COURSE NOT! I don't see any way this won't be misery heaped on misery. The pilot had a grieving father stick his dead daughter's ghost in a battlebot, for Hera's sake. Hilarity ensues?
Minor problem 2: Religious cults, racial predjudice, terrorism, narcissism, corruption- all very important topics. All very tired of them now.
Major problem 1: 1950's hats don't make it SF! Tatoos, drug dens, lawyers, thugs, corporate scumbags etc etc don't make it SF. What we have here, kids, is called a drama. Call a Tauron a Tauron. Also, I think the people looking for drama are going to be put off if you're occasionally cutting to some robot yanking its own arm out. So, way to alienate old and new audiences.
Major problem 2 and Deal Breaker: I have begun a project inspired by A.J.Jacobs' 'The Guinea Pig Diaries'. He called it UNI-TASKING: he tried not to multi-task for a month in the belief that it would make him (I think?) happier or more productive or some damn thing. Anyway, when I started uni-tasking (that is, WATCHING TV when I'm watching TV, rather than trying to read simultaneously or what have you) I discovered I am MUCH more bored than I thought I was. Smallville's latest attempt to be a PG rated Saw movie and Battlebland Galactistink (as I have just dubbed Caprica) are very likely to be my first casualties of this premise: if it cannot hold your whole attention, why give it ANY of your attention?

My Favorite Characters: Annoying but Alphanumeric

Thank the User for Teletoon Retro! I can watch the Jetsons now at almost any time of day or night! (Except I discovered I don't ever want to.)
But never mind that: I have access at last to the finest Canadian CGI program ever to off-line before it had a chance to fully compile: ReBoot. I hear what all you Sprites are saying out there... you've never heard of it! But seriously, back in the '90's I was exactly the target audience for this clever, parody-heavy adventure set in the world inside your computer:
1. I already had a deep, abiding, and unhealthy love for the movie TRON (similar premise, less jokes).
2. I likes me the green girls. (see... oh, any previous post) Dot was a welcome addition to the veridian pantheon.
3. Mike the TV.
Voiced by Michael Donovan, Mike the TV is a hyperkinetic, drivel-spewing machine. (Particularily as a teenager, let's just say I could relate.) Mike was the TV of Guardian Bob, the lead character, who rarely had much sucess with appliances. Mike was so annoying, his own remote control ran away. Mike took a succession of jobs: emcee, game warrior, underling to an insane virus, news correspondant, underling to a second, even crazier virus...
The thing is, even under the insidious, will-sapping indoctrination of the well-intentioned virus Daemon, I could still count on Mike to be the FUNNEST possible sort of zealot.
I think I like best that a one-joke guy can just plain grow on you until he seems like something more. In a reality CREATED by nerdlings, parody is so much a part of life that almost everything is a joke, and Mike knows it. There's plenty of great characters on ReBoot. Dour Matrix. Inscutable Phong. Tough-As-Nails AndrAIa. The slimiest-bug-in-the-web: Megabyte.
So, yes, I admit it. I like the funny. If the nice folks at Rainmaker intend to win me over with their proposed movie follow-up, please copy-and-paste that: I like the funny. ReBoot seasons 3 and 4 were a valiant attempt at a show with more depth, and I feel they suceeded brilliantly. But they never lost track of fun. Even if the movie never comes to pass, ReBoot was an excellent program.
And there's always TRON: Legacy!

The Hugos: The Big Time

Bookmonkey's posted his review about a Hugo winner by Fritz Leiber called 'The Wanderer'.
My own Leiber for today is 'The Big Time', the 1958 Hugo winning novel. Like almost every other fifties Hugo winner, I liked it immensely and I read it more than three years ago.
I liked it well enough to buy my own copy (pictured left) and to want to reread it again. I liked it well enough to give it 4 stars out of 4 on my little review sheet. I can't for the life of me conjure up a lot of details anymore. I remember thinking it would make a great stage play or awesome low-budget movie, since it's all set in one room: a combination operating theater and nightclub for time-traveling soldiers fighting "The Change War". The Change War or 'Big Time' is a war taking place across all of time. Kind of like the Temporal Cold War of Star Trek: Enterprise or the oft-mentioned Time War of 21st Century Doctor Who. Except Leiber did it first.
Instead of Time Lords vs Daleks or Romulans vs Humans the Change War is being fought by the Spiders and the Snakes. (our protagonist works for the Spiders, so that SORT OF makes them the good guys?) No one fighting it knows for sure. Also nobody knows what started the war or how it ends (if it ever ends) but they know they have to escalate it ad infinitum to affect the ever-changing timeline. They battle on from the murk of mythology to the uncertain future a billion years hence. It's full of cool concepts: one I was particularly fascinated by was a medical device that INVERTED patients without killing them so the doctor could repair their wounds without cutting the skin. If I may be permitted a 'Yeeurggghhh'?
It's a deeply engrossing book with good characters, and it's short and sweet. May I recommend reading it once you've read 'The Wanderer'? Or in publication order. Either way works. (But the Spiders want you to read it in publication order. And the Spiders DEFINITELY have your best interests at heart.)